ALEXANDER REID HILL Bsc, Phd Alex Hill Was a Popular Senior
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ALEXANDER REID HILL BSc, PhD Alex Hill was a popular Senior Lecturer in Agricultural Zoology at the University of Glasgow and, over his 36 years of teaching there, his students went all over the world to help the development of agriculture, especially in underdeveloped countries. Alex was born in Dundee on the 17th October, 1919 and died on the 21st October, 2006. With his passing, Scotland lost an influential teacher and an innovative researcher in agricultural zoology. Alex Hill's parents were both born in Aberdeen from Aberdeenshire families. His father, Alexander Stewart Hill (born in 1884), and his mother, Barbara Bishop Reid (born in 1883) died within a few weeks of each other in 1948. Both parents encouraged Alex, who was an only child, in his interests and from an early age he found scientific matters fascinating. It was when he began to study biology that he knew he had found his real field of work. One of his early teachers, Miss E.B. Taylor, encouraged him to join the Dundee Naturalists' Society and there he learned much of his basic knowledge of natural history. Advice too, was received from his uncle, Archibald Stewart Hill, who was an experienced naturalist and artist who had illustrated publications on Fungi and Orchids for the Milwaukee Museum. Alex attended Blackness Primary School, Dundee (1925-29) and then Harris Academy Primary and Secondary School, Dundee (1929-37), where he was awarded a Dundee Educational Trust Bursary in 1930 and, in 1937, the Pitkeathly Dux medal in Biology. In October, 1937, he matriculated at the University of St Andrews (University College, Dundee) to study for the degree of Bachelor of Science and during his time there he won University Medals in Natural History (1938) and Botany (1939). In 1941 he was awarded a BSc in Zoology with First Class Honours. The breadth of Alex's interests in biology were shown in his final year, when he was privileged to have W.T. Calman FRS, formerly Keeper of Zoology in the British Museum, as a tutor. Two theses were produced by Alex, one on the fossil fish of Angus, the other on respiratory organs in terrestrial Isopoda. Later in 1941, in receipt of a Carnegie Research Scholarship, Alex started postgraduate research in agricultural entomology under Professor A.D. Peacock. The latter had become involved in essential war-time research on infestations of insects in stored food and as a result, the Ministry of Food decided to establish an Infestation Division with scientists posted throughout the UK, many seconded from posts in the universities. Professor Peacock was asked to organise staff in Scotland and, as a result, Alex found himself in Dundee, engaged part-time in the inspection of food stores throughout Scotland. By the spring of 1943, the Infestation Division of the Ministry of Food was well established with a number of full-time scientific inspectors, including Alex. Monitoring activities ranged from Ministry food stores to food-processing plants and from major flour mills to small rural mills. Much time was spent by Alex and his colleagues at the seaports of Glasgow, Leith and Dundee, inspecting cargoes of foodstuffs for any infestations. If such were found they were decontaminated at the points of entry so that the introduction of massive infestations was prevented. This was regarded as essential work and continued after the war on a reduced scale. In 1946, Alex was appointed as entomologist to a scientific study unit which had been set up in 1943 in the University College Dundee to study the increasing incidence of diseases in raspberry crops. This was financed by the Agricultural Research Council. Priority was given to a search for vectors of the viruses which were causing a decline in the health of raspberries. With his colleague, plant pathologist Colin Cadman, Alex Hill surveyed the insects associated with the raspberries and chose to investigate the possibility that the two aphid species most commonly found might be the vectors. Over the previous quarter of a century all attempts to discover the true vectors had been inconclusive but, by careful choice of indicator varieties, taking young plant tissue raised from seed or root cuttings, and by using large numbers of aphids, the two scientists were able to show conclusively that the aphids Amphorophora rubi and Aphis idaei were indeed capable of transmitting most of the viruses. This discovery of the vectors of the viruses opened up a wide field of investigation into the nature of the viruses and the epidemiology of the diseases. Alex's work was subsequently expanded to investigate the bionomics and control of the Raspberry Moth Incurvaria rubiella. Outbreaks of this pest had occurred on a large scale from time to time and one such outbreak had overtaken the growers in the mid-1940s. Though still based in Scotland, from 1946-49 Alex was actually on the staff of the East Malling Research Station in Kent and he made occasional visits there in connection with his research. His future wife, Mary, was also a member of staff at the Dundee laboratory where they both worked. In 1948, Alex was awarded the Degree of PhD by the University of St Andrews for a thesis based on his research in the previous three years. In that same important year, on the 25th August, Alex married Mary Barbara Watt in Park Church, Dundee. Subsequently the couple had three children: Peter Watt Hill, Ann Barbara Hill and Robin Edward Hill, all of whom Alex was inordinately proud of. Following the initiation in 1949 of various lectureships in agricultural science by the University of Glasgow, Alex Hill was appointed there as Lecturer in Agricultural Zoology and Applied Entomology. After an initial year involved in giving courses in general and agricultural zoology, he persuaded the head of the department, Professor Maurice Yonge, FRSE, to allow him to develop an Honours Degree in Agricultural Zoology. Alex then started to organise advanced third and fourth year classes in pure science which were pertinent to agricultural zoology (e.g. ecology and parasitology), and, from 1950 onwards, a number of students followed these courses - many of them subsequently obtaining senior posts in various parts of the world. Alex later initiated a post- graduate course leading to a Diploma in Entomology, which was subsequently expanded to an MSc Degree in Entomology. Both these courses attracted many overseas students to the University. In 1955, Alex successfully applied for a Carnegie Travelling Scholarship and a Kellogg Foundation Travelling Fellowship to visit North America and carry out some research there. He spent time at the University of California at Berkeley, at the Plant Pathology Laboratory in Vancouver and at the Canadian Government Experimental Farm at Ottawa, carrying out research and visiting other research institutions. He was accompanied in North America by his wife and young son, Peter. Just prior to going to North America, Alex had started research on the bionomics of predatory bugs (Hemiptera Heteroptera) of the genus Anthocoris and a major product of his visit was a key for the identification of North American Anthocoris. After returning to Glasgow, Alex, by this time a Senior Lecturer, pursued this interest for many years, publishing the results in various scientific journals as well as fulfilling his teaching duties and supervision of research students. Alex's interest in Anthocoris bugs was a practical one. He had never been a devotee of the use of chemicals to control pests and preferred to develop techniques using their natural predators and parasites. Anthocoris bugs prey extensively on aphids and other small pest insect species and clearly had a role to play in pest control. In 1958, Alex was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. He was also an active member of various other organisations - the Institute of Biology (serving twice on the Scottish Committee), the Royal Entomological Society of London (Fellow), the Association of Biologists (Council member), the British Ecological Society, the Scottish Wildlife Trust (Clyde Area Committee member) and the Scottish Field Studies Association. Alex's last research interest in the years before his retirement was a reversion to the aphids with which he had started his research career. Initially he studied a species of cereal aphid but subsequently moved on to important research on the aphids involved in the transmission of virus diseases of potatoes. It was known that in some years the spread of certain potato viruses markedly increased and an analysis of meteorological data indicated a relationship between the spread of such viruses and the severity of the previous winter. Alex and his research students concentrated their investigations on the cold hardiness of the most important aphid vector species Myzus persicae and showed that in this, and other potato aphids, the extent of virus diseases could be predicted from the nature of the previous winter, thus allowing for better planning in their control. Much of this work was published in the Annales of Applied Biology. After he retired, Alex made a conscious decision to discontinue his academic research, although he was very tempted by an approach to carry out some part-time scientific work around Loch Lomond. He declined the invitation, noting that he was determined to enjoy his retirement with Mary, and to spend time with his family around the country. This he did for more than 20 years, encouraging his four grandchildren to take an interest in science and nature, in the arts and, not least, in compassionate living. As an elder at Wellington Church, Glasgow, he remained very active in church life well into his eighties. He also indulged his passion for visual arts and photography, and enjoyed reading and listening to music.